


Drawing Hands

by Schgain



Category: Fallout: New Vegas
Genre: Autistic Character, Emotional/Psychological Abuse, Hey did you know? BioShock is a good game + someone at obsidian must have liked it, Nonbinary Courier, based on The Gunrunner's Arsenal challenge 'A Slave Obeys'
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-10-25
Updated: 2017-10-25
Packaged: 2019-01-23 00:10:15
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 2
Words: 3,925
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12494008
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Schgain/pseuds/Schgain
Summary: The Courier with a BioShock-flavored origin story!---Jack Escher grows up with scientists. For them, the line between human and machine has always been blurred, and something they haven't worried about. But the Mojave is vast and full of people who are all very different, and they are ill-prepared for it and the job they undertook.They are even less prepared, when the line between what they know and what they don't also begins to blur.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Jack Escher is named not only after the protagonist of BioShock, Jack Wynand, but also the face in the regular deck. Escher comes from all of Big Mountain's employees having names that relate to infinity, M.C. Escher being an artist who made a career out of his optical illusions, impossible shapes, and tessellations. 
> 
> The title of this fic comes from one of M.C. Escher's most popular works, Drawing Hands, which features two illustrated hands positioned in a way so that they are drawing each other. It also coincidentally can refer to cards: drawing a hand means adding more to your deck. 
> 
> A Preemptive Note: Mobius' dialogue features typos. That's on purpose. 
> 
> All that being said, this was very self indulgent! But I adore comments, so if you leave any, I would be very grateful!

-4-

Their first memory is of sitting on a cold metal table in pajamas, their feet dangling over the edge, no socks and no shoes. There are voices, things they hear but don't understand, and floating metal figures, moving about with guided purpose. It's strange, but they're not frightened by it. Screens turn to face them, and a metal object touches them. This too is unpleasant, but it's still not scary. No hands come to pick them up, no one addresses them, and the voices keep talking. Some are louder than others, and that is the scary part, and that is when they start to cry.

-5-

Another memory, not long after their first, is of them sitting at a table. Their feet are still dangling, but this time they have socks and shoes and better clothes, even if they don't fit right and get dirty easily. They are holding a pen in one hand and carefully writing the letters that Uncle Borous is spelling out. "Jack Escher", in large, clumsy letters, dominates the top row of the page. 

"You should have named it Penrose!" Says Uncle 0 to Uncle Borous. 

"I did it, look," says Jack Escher, who goes unheard. Pointing to their name on the page does not help. The adults are talking, and getting through to them is a pointless venture. They know this even as young as they are.

"It's too late now, too late now!" says Uncle Borous to Uncle 0, looking down at Jack. "Isn't that right, Gabe?" 

"Jack," they correct, which earns them a quizzical look from Uncle Borous.

"I could have sworn it was Gabe," he says, looking between child and paper. "Jack Escher. Now that has a nice ring to it. Why don't we call you that?" 

-7-

The lights above are usually humming and white and steady in their glow, but now they are blaring an awful alarm and are bright red and are flashing on and off. It's frightening, more frightening than most things here, and Jack covers their ears with their hands and begin to wail. 

"WILL ONE OF YOU GET THE INSUFFERABLE GENE SPAWN OUT OF HERE AND STOP ITS INCESSANT SCREECHING?" screams Dr. Klein, and Uncle 8 quickly hovers over, low enough to put one of his screens to Jack's upper back and nudge them away. 

"Come on, come on," he says, voice shaky. 

"What's happening?" asks Jack, pulling their hands from their ears. 

"A man was found in the facility. Very dangerous! He mustn't know you're here, so you are going to be put away until he has been dealt with." Uncle 8 herds them into their room with just as much haste and watches the door slide shut behind him.

Jack reaches up to grab a hold of a metal arm that holds a monitor. "Will you stay with me?" 

"I can't," says Uncle 8, but he does anyways, just a little while. He eventually floats out, and Jack can hear the think tanks talking to someone, and then yelling. There always seems to be yelling. When the lights stop being red, it's Aunt Dala that fetches them, and she doesn't say anything about Uncle 8 until later.

-8-

"It really is a shame your voice module got broken," says Aunt Dala, not looking at Uncle 8 even when he answers in a mix of static. She doesn't sound like she means it though, Jack thinks. She's busy applying a bandaid to Jack's scraped knee, decorated in a long-forgotten Big MT mascot. "I know you were so fond of talking to those humans. We still agree on that, at least." She gives Jack a consoling pat, just as distracted as her words to Uncle 8. 

"I can put it on myself," says Jack. 

"I know you can, Teddy Bear," she says, still in her fake comfort voice, "but Dala hasn't been able to play doctor with anyone in a long time." 

They frown at her and roll down their pant leg. She doesn't seem to mind that, and helps them down from the table. 

-12-

The bullet pierces through the metalloid carapace of the robo-scorpion with a loud PONG. Blue sparks shoot up, and the thing backfires a bit before falling limp in the dust.

"Excellent shot, my dear!" Says Uncle 0. He waves his mouth monitor in a way that Jack knows to read as a smile or excitement. "Wonderful execution- in both senses of the word. See if you can remotely demolish that robodog next, yes?" 

They raise their rifle once more, aim their sights, and pull the trigger. The robot crumples. 

"At this rate, we'll be able to take out the entirety of Mobius' so-called army!" says 0. That gets a sheepish smile out of Jack. 

-15-

"Doctor Klein, I brought the reports. Printed it out and everything. Fixed, um, the paper recycling, too. Now it...recycles paper. Instead of turning bones into powder." Jack says. "That was Dala's idea, wasn't it..."

"WHAT? OH. IT'S YOU. LET ME KNOW WHEN YOU ENTER NEXT TIME SO I CAN IGNORE YOU PROPERLY, ESCHER!" A monitor lifts over what could possibly called his shoulder to look at his ward.

Jack sighs through their nose. "The forms?" 

"THE FORMS. MMMMMS. RIGHT. PUT THEM THERE ON MY DESK, AND DON'T TOUCH ANYTHING!" Klein says, blustering about. "DID YOU SAY YOU GOT THE PRINTER WORKING?" 

They set down the paper and pause. "Yes?" 

"AMATEUR, BUT GOOD. AT LEAST SOMEONE HAS HALF A NEURON STILL FUNCTIONING IN THIS DOME FULL OF EMPTYHEADED EXCUSES OF DOCTORATES!" He pauses, then gives Jack a look-over. "AND HANDS. FOR GRABBING THINGS THAT ARE CLOGGING UP BIGGER, MORE IMPORTANT THINGS. INGS. TING. TING!" 

"Thank you, Doctor Klein," says Jack. That's almost a compliment, and they're not about to look a gift horse in the mouth. 

"NOW GET OUT, I HAVE LOTS OF WORK TO DO AND A VERY ANGRY LETTER TO WRITE!" He shouts. 

"Doctor Mobius?" Jack asks. Apparently a message had come in that morning from the Forbidden Zone. Jack had slept through it, but it had put the entire Think Tank under a haze of heavy paranoia and hard drug de-stressing therapy. Getting any information about what the message had been about would be useless until their uncles and aunt came down from their mentats high. 

"OF COURSE IT'S THAT QUACK!" Klein says. "WHO ELSE COULD BE SO POSITIVELY GRATING ON THE NATURE OF SCIENTIFIC PROGRESS BUT HIM?" 

Jack supposes they don't have an answer to that. Mobius is of course very dangerous; would an angry letter really be enough to keep him at bay? They suppose that Klein has been handling him more than they have, but it seems ineffective. 

They take the recycling out of Klein's workspace as they head out. Maybe they ought to write a letter to Dr. Mobius as well. 

-17-

When Jack stumbles into their room, they don't think of the Sink being quiet. They're too tired to listen to the appliances with GPP chatter on about nothing anyways, so they flop into their bed without a second thought as to why the Light Switches are neither working nor verbal. 

They don't even stir when something rolls them out of bed and carefully picks them up. It's only when they hear voices do they become part of the living again, feeling cold metal against their arms and somehow sitting up, if a little slouched.

"Now just-- sit there-- yes, don't fall, that's it... KLEIN!" 

"MOBIUS!"

...Mobius?

"As you may or may not have noticed, I have purloined your precious human test subject! If you will not submit to my demands, I will preform massive quantities of experiments on them!" 

"SO?" 

"And.... I shall not share with you the results!" 

Someone gasps.

Jack opens their eyes. 

They're slumped in a chair- not restrained- and a familiar, villainous Think Tank hovers in front of them, speaking to a massive monitor screen- they can see Klein, Dala, and 0 projected on it, no doubt looking at their own. 

"You have twenty-four hours to comply!" Says Mobius, and goes to shut off the screen. 

Aunt Dala can be heard saying "Wait, what were his dema--" 

It turns black with an audible blip, and the nefarious Dr. Mobius faces Jack. "That should buy us ample time, shouldn't--"

Jack punches him in the eye monitor. 

Glass splinters around their fist, fractures puncturing their knuckles. Gold and blue sparks shoot up from the hole in Mobius' face. "Oh!" He yells as he propels backwards. He then realizes he's hurt, and answers that sensation with a yelp of pain. "Oh, ouch!" When he rights himself and the pain begins to fade, he looks from the smoking crater that was part of his face to Jack. "Ah, I see. Forgot the whole tying-up part. That's usually an essential part in any kidnapping! Lack of forethought, I suppose. Listen now, I know what I said to your colleagues, but ransom is not the raisin I brought you here at all! Quiet the opposite!" 

"What?" Jack's face must be one of bewilderment, because they stop trying to pull glass shards out of their hand to try to figure out what this man is saying. If not for something evil, what could this possibly be about? 

"Jack Escher," recites Mobius, "you are a very special person with a very special set of genes. You were made by Big Mountain to do great things! Almost twenty years ago your colleagues had been given a... a commission of sorts, to do with their natural talent in biology. They finished the experiment, and very promptly forgot about it through my meddling. But the time has come for you to do just what you'd been perfect for all these years." 

Jack is given the impression that he had been waiting a long time to say this speech he had repaired. And yet, no response comes to mind; all they can manage is another quiet "what?" 

"Things lost in the dessert," he says kindly (when has Jack ever known Mobius to be kind?), "often find their way in the dessert." Something slides out of the chassis of his tank: a small disc, white metal, engraved with a pattern of rectangles on the rim. It falls into their injured hand, heavier than it looks, and they stare at the little dits and dahs that are displayed on it. "It's called a platinum chip," says Mobius, "and it is nearly as special as you are. Take this, too- the delivery order. Yours, and the chip's. Don't loose it!" A piece of paper is proffered to them.

"Why are you doing this for me?" asks Jack, their eyes not leaving the small metal chip. Their other hand takes the paper, not even caring to look at it. It can't be more important than this.

"Because, as I've said! You're special. You were made to do great things." Mobius moves slightly, and Jack looks up at him. He is doing what they know is a smile in think tank body language, and yet they can't find the courage to smile back. Their fingers close around the chip, and resolve settles in their features. 

"I'll come back, though." they say. It's not a question.

"I'm quiet sure you will! Everything here will be largely the same, yes, not to worry." He nods, and that alone is comforting. "It was good to meet you before you left, Jack Escher. I hope you remember your time at Big Mountain fondant." 

They look up at him, about to say something, but the blue light of a transportalponder cuts them off, and 

Jack Escher is

alone

in the Mojave.


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Big warning for emotional abuse here. Please tread with caution and stay safe!

-10/19/2281-

"So the kid practically falls out of the sky. No records of who they are. No one's ever seen them before, and it's not like someone'd forget those gloomy yellow eyes, huh? So I ask around, finally get an idea of who this kid is. Turns out they're a Courier with a Capital C." 

Jack Escher blinks into wakefulness to the sound of someone talking— make that several someones talking actually— and it sounds as if the people cannot decide on whether or not they are attempting to be as discrete as they are emphasizing with shushes. It's definitely not a pleasant conversation to wake up to, and a pain wracks their skull in waves as the world fails to focus around them. They're laying down, yet it still spins, and they can't make heads or tails of anything. Their wrists are tied, and they can't find the strength to pull at the rope that binds them. Jack's head hurts.

"Guess who's waking up over here?" 

Their eyes still can't focus, but their head tilts up to look at the speakers. A man, in a white suit with a black gingham pattern, takes a drag on a cigarette before putting it out beneath his foot. He's looking down at them in whay Jack can only guess is in an appraising manner, and when he sees their yellow eyes begin to glow, he grimaces and looks away. Good. Whoever this man is deserves to be creeped out by them.

"Would you get it over with?" someone says. 

"Maybe Khans kill people without looking them in the face, but I ain't a fink, dig?" says the man in the gingham suit, turning to look at another man.

Jack's head hurts. Someone from behind grabs their forearm, yanks them into a sitting position, and the world tilts all over again. 

"Kid, you've made your last delivery." The man in the gingham suit is speaking, not even giving Jack a chance to try and refocus the world. Without even making sure they're watching, he pulls something out of his pocket— the chip!— and tucks it away just as quickly. "Sorry you got twisted up in this scene; still don't know how you did it. From where you're kneeling, it must seem like an 18-carat run of bad luck." He pulls something else out of his pocket. A gun, golden and shining, is pointed directly at them. The barrel clicks. 

"Truth is...the game was rigged from the start."

Jack's head hurts.

-10/20/2281-

"It's lucky I found you kickin' when I still did, pardner!" says the robot who had introduced himself as Victor. So far he's been the easiest one to talk to in all of Goodsprings. Jack likes him already; people are hard, they've found, but not machines. They know where they stand with machines. 

"Why'd you do that, anyways?" they ask. Sitting on a rotting fence next to a giant robot on a wheel and talking about one's death seems so surreal that they have no choice but to go along or get caught up in their distress about the whole situation. It's not that they're ungrateful, but they just don't understand why someone would go out of their way to help another. They will admit that it feels nice, though.

"Just felt concerned when I heard that gunshot ring up at the top of the hill, and whaddaya know, a little responsible for ya, too." His hand reaches out to pat their shoulder, very gently. Jack gets the impression he could do a lot worse, if he didn't know his own strength. "Folks 'round here like a good Samaritan, and more than a few of us tend to be a l'il nosy. Can't say I ain't one of 'em." That makes Victor laugh at his own joke, and Jack can't say they understand it. But he's the first nice face they can be comfortable with since waking up in this town, so they smile along as he continues. "Hope you don't mind other folks here pokin' around, either. They can't help themselves none, and it's not like they don't mean well. No one's ever come back from the grave like you have." 

"I guess I don't mind," they say, looking up the hill at Doc Mitchell's house, "I've just never been around this many people before. And you're all so... nice. Except for the men who shot me, of course."

"You just come outta nowhere on the map, get shot, and never met a living soul 'fore that to boot?" There's sympathy in Victor's augmented voice, and Jack suddenly feels very self-conscious. They look at him only a moment before staring forward at the houses of Goodsprings.

"Not a lot," they say quietly, "just my aunt and uncles. And they were robots, sort of." 

"Sorta?" 

"They weren't always like that." Jack says it a little too sharply, and they can see Victor shift, almost recoiling in place of a raised eyebrow, and they regret that. 

He changes the subject after that.

-10/23/2281-

Robots will always be easier to understand than humans, Jack think, scrubbing blood off ED-E's hull. It beeps at them, and they mimic the noises if only because they can and because the mouthsound is nice. 

They prefer ED-E's company to a lot of the people they have met so far, actually. It's a good listener, and not just by following orders. The little eyebot really seems to enjoy hearing Jack talk, and that'd be a first. When they're on the road, they can count on ED-E to help them. And ED-E can count on Jack to tell a good story along the way. 

It's a good trade.

-10/31/2281- 

The terminal Dr. Gannon is trying to work with is being stubborn, and Jack doesn't know why; it should have opened access for him pretty much automatically. 

"Can I try, Dr. Gannon?" Jack asks. 

"You don't have to call me— yeah, go ahead." He steps back and gestures to the terminal as if to say 'all yours', its monitor flickering its characteristically unpleasant green. Jack steps in to replace his spot in front of it, fingers hovering over the keyboard. 

"You're getting a System.Point.Null.Exception every time? Why?" 

"They're a standard redirect for RobCo. products like these when they have something to hide," Arcade explains, "creating a loop for a user to get stuck in rather than being able to access the administrator bypass in the first place." 

"That's never happened to me before." they frown. "Watch." They pull up the page, and the NullReferenceException flickers away to a new screen with the appropriate login. Jack doesn't even need to type as they're accepted into the terminal's information logs. 

"Just like that?" asks Dr. Gannon. "How did you manage to ignore the genetic security lock?" 

Jack steps out of his way, tilting their head slightly at the question. "The what?" 

-11/14/2281-

"So, I've been meaning to ask you!" says Veronica, leaning over as Jack fiddles with their plasma pistol. 

"People asking me questions is always a nice change of pace." they joke. She laughs at that. 

"What's with the glowing eyes? Is it radiation? Chems? Something else? Oh, was that rude?" Still, she looks immensely curious; Jack likes that about her. They're two brothers in arms of sticking their noses where they don't belong. 

"I think, maybe if someone else had asked, or if you asked someone else, it would have been. But, um, I don't mind. It's just science. Gene tonics, actually— I was made in a lab." They blink up at her, the glow strong. "Makes me kind of, uh, conspicuous, I think." 

This only increases Veronica's curiosity, they can see it. It's endearing, and relateable. When she smiles, they even manage a small smile back. "You were made in a lab? Why?" 

"For 'Great Things', whatever those may be," they say, turning back to their gun. "No one ever seems to have the foresight to tell me."

"I think you'll do pretty great," says Veronica. "We're still young. We have a lot left to see in this big world." 

-12/24/2281-

"This has been a long time coming, hasn't it?" 

They've never heard that voice before, not really— yet it makes Jack's blood run cold. 

"What the _hell_ are you?" 

Mr. House's portrait on the screen is unchanging. The silence, oppressive. Jack's courage shatters, and they run a thumb along the hem of their coat, feeling the leather under their fingers. Their other hand flexes. 

"Eighteen years ago, an unprecedented security breach allowed for a genome map and a matching genetic sample to leave the Lucky 38. They were to be used in an attempt to override the genetic security keys I have put in place. Eighteen years later, some Courier with a package for me manages to bypass the genetic security on the grounds of being a match. The real question is, what are _you_?" 

Mr. House's voice is steely, barely restrained and livid, and Jack has a sudden memory of being a child and being yelled at by Doctor Klein, impossibly small in the face of anger. A gun pointed at them would be less frightening than a sharply-tuned word, right now. 

"I—" says Jack, "I don't know, entirely, or exactly, I never, or was never—" 

"HOW COULD YOU NOT HAVE KNOWN?" His voice amplifies artificially, and the speakers vibrate with the aftereffects of his outburst. Terror floods Jack's face for a tiny moment, eyes going wide with their pupils narrowing into slits. The man in the computer plays the sound of paper being shuffled around, his anger simmering down into something quieter, pretending he had never yelled at all. "Jack Escher... I'm sure someone thought they were being funny when they named you that. Are you really so doltish to not have put the pieces together? How easily you navigated my technology like it was fit to your hand like the very Pip Boy product you wear on your arm?" 

"I didn't want to think about it—" Jack fumbles for their words. Even now, the truth sounds like an excuse. 

"And why not?" counters Mr. House. "What could possibly hold precedence over your own history, child?" It's not a kindness, not paternal affection; more than a diminutive, it's an outright insult to show just how ashamed of them he is. It's infuriating, and above all else, hurtful. 

"I had better things to be than be yours!" they blurt, and for a blessed moment, Mr. House is silent. The moment turns into several moments, and Jack takes the time to blink away the tears that are threatening to spill, hoping they haven't doomed themself.

"I see." he says finally. "Know this, Jack Escher House, you are my greatest disappointment. Unfortunately, that is still not a high enough honor for me to commit filicide, and for you, patricide has always been impossible." 

He pauses, and Jack can feel his eyes on them from every part of the room, staring through his securitrons or camera surveillance. Once again they're being appraised. "Though I don't think you ever came here with the intention to kill me in the first place. I don't think you ever came here knowing what you really wanted." 

"So, we're at an impasse?" Jack ventures. Being read by this man is the greatest unkindness that this wasteland has bestowed upon them, and they want nothing more than go back to Goodsprings, crawl in their own shallow grave, and die again. They don't know what they expected of him. 

Mr. House scoffs. "Hardly." he says, "You are an illegitimate, genetic mistake of a bastard, but you still are my employee, and on top of that my intellectual and biological property. I still have a job for you to do."


End file.
